[Bill Tsafa]

[Michael Edelson]

[Bill Tsafa]

There is a whole Cut and Thrust program in the SCA that uses steel blunt swords. The hitting calibration is similar to WMA. The whole body is a target area. A lot of people who normally fight rattan will play with blunts at the drop of a hat and the change of a helmet.

The winning vs learning issue, we both agree, is not specific to SCA or WMA. That is an individual choice. A person can also do both at different times. Example... fight to win tournaments... Practice on a Wednesdays for tournaments... Work on historical technique on Sundays. People do this, its not just hypothetical.

I have a person at my Sunday practice who has studied Kung Fu for 20 years. He is eager to both learn whatever he have can from us, and teach us whatever we individually want to learn from him.

[Michael Edelson]

My apologies, I didn't make myself clear. I didn't mean to differentiate between the various simulators. What I meant was that no matter how realistic you try to make it, free play is not sword fighting. In my opinion, if a practicioner believes that free play is close enough to real combat that there is no real distinction and that winning at free play is the goal of that person's training, then by definition that person is engaged in a martial sport, not a martial art.

My point was that if you state that wining a free play session (as opposed to say demonstrating the use of historic techniques in a free play session) is a means to prove something, then that seems to imply that you view what you do as a martial sport, and since I don't believe that to be true in your case, I felt the need to point out that such statements undermine your credibility.

Here's the way I see it: in a martial art, the emphasis is on real combat, not simulated combat, and simulated combat is used to teach lessons that can be applied to real combat. Simulated combat is but one of many tools, all of which are a fraction of the whole, and all of which are necessary. These tools are solo practice, paired drills, fencing theory, test cutting and free play (and maybe others too). No one of these can or should be used to measure someone's performance or to prove the validity of their interpretations...they must be taken as a whole.

Keep in mind that these are my views on the subject, and though I am not alone in seeing things this way, there are other ways to look at it, no less valid than my own. Ultimately it's up to each practicioner to define martial art, martial sport, WMA and all the other things we're discussing in a way that suits them. There is room for multiple views on this, as with most things.

[Bill Tsafa]

I respect your view Michael and agree with much of it.

When someone comes along and says that a particular fighting style is complete bunk... I feel that some way must be devised to test the theory. Perhaps the test may have 25% flaws but against the idea that a particular fighting system is completely useless then, in my opinion, such a test would be sufficient.

Other then that I am perfectly happy to keep the two separate.

[Bill Grandy]

[Jean-Carle Hudon]

I would fall in line with Michael and Bill on this matter. The free use of ''martial art'' to describe just about anything doesn't help much. As I have stated before, I have no problem with stick fighting SCA style, I enjoy it most of the time, except when the other guy cries out ''LIght!! Light!!'' after his head has moved four or five inches from the reception of the shot... but as I mentionned before, that's a people issue, and does not negate the value of the game, or sport... but neither does it help in arguing that such a subjective form of activity should be considered a martial art.
Tactical training for the riot squad is not a martial art either, neither is a street fight behind a mall somewhere, not two hockey players flailing away on skates for that matter. These activities all involve violence for sure, but none of them involve the disciplined study of violence as a way to neutralize an adversary in a true conflict.The Hockey players are waiting for the Referees to get involved and separate them. Riots involve citizens who are out of control for different reasons, and the officers involved know full well that their purpose is to move the crowd along in the least damaging way possible, not to neutralize the adversary at all costs, otherwise the riot would soon excalate to a status of armed conflict where martial intervention would become necessary.That is no longer a riot, but civil war. If riot squad training is to be considered a martial art, then the opponents, in this case rioters looting and throwing potatoes with nails in them also becomes a martial art form ...
A street fight is what it is, anything goes and pray that your opponent doesn't just flip out a knife or gun as you impress him with your pugilistic skills ('' I know Karate'' says one, '' Yeah, well I know Colt 45'' says the other....very old and very bad joke).
If you water down the concept of a martial art to include anything you personally enjoy doing, then you end up with an empty concept.

[Gavin Kisebach]

[F. Carl Holz]

Jean-Carle,
I don't particularly care for you final sentence as I feel it gives the wrong idea about what people are trying to do when they say that the SCA is (or isn't) a martial art, but I must agree with the rest of your post.
If a martial art is

[Bill Tsafa]

Lets break it down in a list and compare the two in a table form.

...................................................................................... WMA....................................... SCA
Use of simple cuts and guards to build upon: ....................... Yes......................................... Yes
Use of drills to develop technique:......................................... Yes........................................ Yes
Use of predetermined attacks and defenses............................Yes........................................ Yes
Flexibility to adjust as the fight develops.................................Yes........................................ Yes
Priority of defense and attacking defensively........................... Yes......................................... Yes
Ability to kill if weapons were real...........................................Yes......................................... Yes
Verifiable by historical sources................................................Yes(1).....................................Yes(2)
Open to influences from other fighting arts................................?(3)..........................................Yes
Used in Melee tactics............................................................?(3)..........................................Yes
Free mixing of weapon forms..................................................?(3)..........................................Yes

(sorry about the misaligned columns. It is hard to get straight in this post format. It looks straight when I type it)

(1) The level of historical sources may vary with the different weapon forms. For example while we have a good deal of information on longsword and rapier, we have a limited amount of information on buckler, poleax, sickles, dueling shields. A good deal of extrapolation is done from one source to another on forms were less historical information exists.

(2)We see through period art and literature the the detailed use of shieldwalls and flanking maneuvers as a staple of combat. We also see the use of skirmishing units and archers to break up lines. We see the use of terrain to aid in combat. All these things will will employed at any large melee battle in the SCA.

Furthermore, while the individual SCA techniques did not originate from historical manuals, the historical manuals as they have been recently interpreted serve as validation of techniques used in the SCA. The techniques I have been taught all originate from the lower body. Their is a good deal of similarity between the various strikes with sword and shield. on-side/offside=Zwerchhue, slot shot=Schielhau, Krumphue- there is an advanced offside people use. It is very good at getting into someone ribs or arm. Scheitelhau- there is an funky on-side shot we use to get over shields topside. Zornhues come into play when people fight single sword or greatsword. The use of these techniques becomes more apparent when you see people fight greatsword since it is more recognizable in that form. Do they transition for guard to guard... obviously if you swing and don't come back to a guard to rest you get killed. I talk to a lot of people who have studied Asian sword arts in the SCA, they see similar similarities with the Asian sword arts.


(3) Just because the information is not available to us does not mean it did not exist.

[Bill Grandy]

[Bill Grandy]

Vassilis,
I think you're missing the point with your chart. Is the purpose of SCA combat to fight? No, it is a recreational activity with simulated combat elements done for fun. Is historical swordsmanship intended for the purpose of recreational fighting? It can be in some circumstances for some people, but ultimately no. It is intended to discover how people actual fought when these arts were still alive. They aren't the same thing. They might overlap in some areas, but the end goals of practicing one over the other are different.

As has been said multiple times, its an apples to oranges comparison. I could make a similar list of the traits that apples and oranges might have in common (both have skins on the outside, both look good in a fruit bowl, etc), but they're still different fruits altogether. There's no reason to try so hard to put them in the same category.

[Bill Tsafa]

I fence rapier too Bill. All the guards I hold, parries, disengages, swipes and closing of lines when I attack are similar to the ones you use. Since I started fencing before I had gained an interest in history, the purpose originally was to have fun. The fact that the effective techniques I use happen to be historical is a nice plus I learned after the fact. The end result is the same. The means to the end is the same since the weapons are similar.

[Gavin Kisebach]

Bill,

As a hypothetical, let's pretend that I make up an eastern martial art tomorrow based on my understanding of a few other forms. Lets say that I develop this for fourty years, and hundreds of thousands people learned to fight that way. Let's call it Svertweg, the "Way of the Sword" (grammar aside).

After 40 years, Svertweg would be pretty well developed. My early misconceptions would be ironed out by literally millions of bouts held by hundreds of thousands of fighters over dozens of years. Many of these fighters would bring their own knowledge of other martial arts, and the form would evolve.

In the eastern martial arts community this happens all the time; dozens of schools of martial arts have been born in the last 50 years in the US alone. Of course people love to debate the merits of Kenpo vs. TKD or Jujitsu vs. Boxing, but not many people would have the gall to say that any of these were not martial arts. Some have longer direct lineages that others, but they are all martial arts.

Now even eastern martial arts like to claim lineage as if that gives them an air of legitimacy, but only in WMA does the the lack of an "H" get confused with a lack of "MA".

And what do you mean by "Is the purpose of SCA combat to fight? No" - is there no fighting in Boxing? Perhaps I misunderstand the word fighting.

I would again argue that there is no "Martial" in WMA if there is emphasis on mass combat. It is interesting that the SCA was earlier compared to gangs. The implication is perhaps that HMA practitioners are by comparison disciplined soldiers, but in truth the fight books that HMA references seem to me to be aids for learning medieval brawling and streetfighting.

Perhaps the HMA should be more properly described as HGA or HFA. You simply cannot compare one on one bouting with the random death of war. Learning to hold a line steady in while watching for incoming arrows is certainly more distinctly martial in my mind than learning to duel.

And do pardon me for sounding heated, having typed it all out I feel much better and less insulted.

[Vincent Le Chevalier]

The martial sport vs. martial art debate is quite interesting...

For me a martial art is in essence a theory of actual combat. The theory is there to allow the fighter to take the best course of action during an actual encounter, to analyze and react to the chaos of combat with a greater efficiency. This theory is exemplified in a set of exercises that are used to train the student. In many case the underlying theory is not specifically taught (though I firmly believe it is better when it is, but that's another debate). I don't think it has to be a matter of life and death systematically, it has to be about a real physical confrontation. So the riot police does indeed practice a martial art, and the rioters that get together beforehand to train tactics against the police are also doing a martial art. I agree that the romantic vision of the martial artist suffers from that

Some of the exercises are done in opposition and lend themselves to competition. A martial sport takes one of the exercise and builds a custom theory around it, fine-tuned to perform optimally in competition, and a new set of exercises to go with it.

So the difference is that a martial art is a theory of actual combat together with some practice of simulated combat, while a martial sport is a theory and practice of simulated combat. The expected context of application is different, thus the theories and exercises should be different.

But of course as Vassilis rightly points out, martial sports and martial arts use some of the same exercises even though the finality is different. Therefore in actual practice, it can happen that both end up looking very close. What makes a martial art stand appart in practice is mainly the diversity of the exercises. For example the weapons changes from test-cutting to solo drills to paired drills to bouting, while it makes more sense for a martial sport to be practiced with the same weapon throughout.

However, there are martial arts that study such a narrow context that you could argue that they are no longer martial arts. I've heard it said that iaido studied on its own does not make much sense as a martial art... And to be honest I have a hard time defending it, because indeed it is practice of a very small subset of the original martial arts (which included kenjutsu and a host of other things). In that sense it suffers from the exact same distorsion as martial sports. I disagree that intent of the study makes that much of a difference: the goal is still to become better at the exercise, whether one hopes to become a better fighter thanks to that or not.

This kind of distorsion could lead to martial artists actually performing worse in real encounters than martial sportsmen, which is sort of ironic. Fortunately we'll never be able to judge in our weapon arts , but what happened in bare-hand fighting with MMA is telling. At the very least it forces us to refine our vision of the proper context of martial arts.

In our reconstructed arts the problem is even bigger, because we have to reverse engineer some parts of the theory, and forms of martial sports are indeed used for that. Disregarding all martial sports and refusing competitive activities (even by our own rules) is not the right way to go in my opinion... It would be ignoring one way to validate our practice.

[Jared Smith]

[Chad Arnow]

I think we just need to see HEMA (in all its forms) and SCA combat (in all its forms) as combat systems. Both have some applications in actual warfare, but neither are generally practiced to be applied on the battlefield. Since the word "martial", in its strictest sense, implies use in war you could argue that neither is a martial art since most people aren't using SCA or HEMA techniques on the battlefield.

The bottom line is that there are different histories, methodologies, and goals for each broad grouping (and within the groups themselves) that make them too different to validly compare. Each has a place in the sword community and in people's lives, and neither is "better" than the other.

[Bill Tsafa]

That is a very fair statement, Chad. It is my opinion that any training system will have shortcomings. That is the very reason why I study as many different training systems as I can get around to. It is my hope that the shortcomings of one will be covered in one of the others.

[Gavin Kisebach]

The irony here Chad is that while I may sound like the SCA's biggest cheerleader, i consider the SCA fighting form to be inferior to HMA; but dismissive claims that SCA fighting has no possible martial application, or even martial aspect, get me hot under the collar.

Debating the advantages and disadvantages of two differing forms is a lot of fun, but being dismissed is not.

[Michael Edelson]

I'm going to do something that I don't fully agree with it, but I think it needs to be done to put Vassilis' chart into perspective. I'm going to add another activity to the chart.

It will be called 2KPwTL, or, 2 Kids Playing with Toys'R'Us Lighstabers:

...................................................................................... WMA....................................... SCA......................................2KPwTL
Use of simple cuts and guards to build upon: ....................... Yes......................................... Yes......................................... Yes
Use of drills to develop technique:......................................... Yes........................................ Yes......................................... Yes
Use of predetermined attacks and defenses............................Yes........................................ Yes......................................... Yes
Flexibility to adjust as the fight develops.................................Yes........................................ Yes......................................... Yes
Priority of defense and attacking defensively........................... Yes......................................... Yes......................................... Yes
Ability to kill if weapons were real...........................................Yes......................................... Yes ...................................... Yes(1)
Verifiable by historical sources................................................Yes(2)................................Yes(2)...................................... Yes(2)
Open to influences from other fighting arts................................?..........................................Yes......................................... Yes
Used in Melee tactics............................................................?..........................................Yes......................................... Yes
Free mixing of weapon forms..................................................Yes..........................................Yes......................................... Yes

(1) real lightsabers!?!? Heck yeah!

(2) If SCA combat gets a yes next to WMA, then by that same extension of logic 2KPwTL gets a yes next to SCA combat, as we are talking about a downward spiral. WMA is based on strict adherence to historical sources, while SCA combat is based on SCA rules, with a smattering of historical techniques where applicable (and where they fit into the rules). 2KPwTL can do the same.

My point here is not to denigrate the SCA...I've stated my opinion on SCA combat and I'm not taking it back with this chart. My point here is that things are not as simple as a yes or no chart, and if you try to simply things to that extent, you're opening the door to all kinds of silliness.